Well I just don't agree David. . . I think these regulation stages allow you to CHANGE the sound of the amp far more than they do any cleaning of the amp. Yes, you can turn that circuit off in earlier versions of the amp and it doesn't sound as good. . . but Steve wouldn't let the amp out sounding that way without the regulation stages, he would have altered the signature. Far more than a "cleansing" stage this is just another tailoring stage to the amp. . . one that I think (in the case of the Torii, which I am very familiar with) is not as essential as you seem to think. I see these as an added expense for the benefit of twiddling the sound with tube rolling more than anything else. And a way to make Decware amps "different." A power regenerator, now THAT really makes a difference, to all components plugged in. Far more profound, imo. This is my experience with more than just one Decware amp with and without voltage regulation stages. Six amps in fact, four without.

Whatever.I know how stubborn we both are and it's not worth more time talking about. Glad you're happy, but the Integrated I had didn't have these stages, and DIDN'T NEED these stages to sound awesome.

I don't want to argue the point any further, each one of us has his own opinion on the matter. I just would like to quote from the Torii Decware literature in this site (Steve Deckert):

How do you get an amplifier to sound like it does at 2:30 A.M. (when the power is cleanest) during the day and virtually every time you listen to it? Tube voltage regulation designed to filter instead of regulate.

First of all, the vast majority of tube amplifiers for sale do not even have tube regulation. Not to mention the obvious... but just because an amplifier has tube regulation doesn't mean it's going to sound better. Tighter and more control, yes. Better? ...not often. The classic shunt regulation so often seen in tube amplifiers that do offer it, often poisons the transparency with injected noise that must be further filtered. The Zen doesn't need tube regulation to improve power supply performance. It features a dual mono design with oversize power supplies, one for each channel. It's a brute force approach that delivers over 300 ma. of current when less than half of that is actually used by the circuit.

In this special amplifier the Voltage Regulation tubes are wired in series with the load. In that configuration they become a filtering device instead of a regulating device. The VR tubes place a measurable vacuum gap between the load and the power supply. This creates Ultra Clean Power because all of the the noise is filtered off. (Noise from pollution in your local power grid that includes the harmonics that ultimately end up at your wall outlet and in your amplifier.)

This hash and grain that poisons virtually everyone's audio gear is eliminated in the Zen TORII. It literally doesn't make the jump across this vacuum gap between the cathode and anode of the VR tubes. Talk about black backgrounds, we could call it the grain eliminator or the liquidity insurance program, or just an unfair advantage over virtually all of our competitors.

This is one of the reasons why we know that unless you own and use a power generator, like the PS AUDIO power plant as an example, there is no way your present amplifier will sound as good as a Zen TORII (...assuming all else was equal and even that's unlikely.) And if it wasn't enough to do it once, we employed this technology on every stage in the amplifier and independently for each channel. That's a lot of GLOW from these beautiful tubes that don't even get hot or wear out!

You won't find tube regulation in the vast majority of power amplifiers, and none that use it in this critically important way. Yet, impressive as it might sound it is only a small part of why the Zen TORII can achieve the unique sound quality that is has.

Unless Mr. Deckert has detracted from his beliefs at the time of designing the Torii, or if you are implying this is just marketing brain-wash, I bought the concept and my real-life results with the Mini supports this, with the blackest of backgrounds this amp is famous for.

Spending significant amounts of money in power aids will improve everything. Best bang for your buck is something some people like me prefer. Thanks!

Unless Mr. Deckert has detracted from his beliefs at the time of designing the Torii, or if you are implying this is just marketing brain-wash, I bought the concept and my real-life results with the Mini supports this, with the blackest of backgrounds this amp is famous for.

Spending significant amounts of money in power aids will improve everything. Best bang for your buck is something some people like me prefer. Thanks!

David, I do think that this is an evolution of the design that serves in part as a clever marketing move as well as a way to make the amps sound different, especially without a preamp (I love preamps) and a way to attract those who like to tinker and change the sound again and again. Better overall perhaps, that's subjective imo. It does make Decware amps stand out as different, an additional contribution to nice marketing. Again, I have Decware amps with and without these stages and thousands of hours of listening to them' that's what I'm basing my opinion on. Not web pages. I'm recounting my experience with Decware amps over more than a decade.

You say "bang for buck" is what you want, and you also say that you are seeking the ultimate sound from your system. If you really want to hear what your amp will do, one day investigate better power conditioning than these voltage regulators. Then you'll hear what the blackest of backgrounds is, etc.

Enough said. Again, choosing an MT or an SE34.2 . . . either is a great choice.

Well I fired off an email to Steve asking his expert opinion...I was reading up on the Phono Pre that I have on order.One of the main reasons I chose the MT over the SE34I was the ability to run without a pre-amp. Well the phono pre is only going to give me 0.5V out which is far too low for both.

That said if I need a pre-amp then there is no reason to get the MT and the CSP+ in my eyes. Someone correct me if I am wrong.

Hopefully a quick chat with Steve I will have my head straight and my decision made.

Ron, you better confirm this with Steve, but the M-T is supposed to have been designed to handle even the weakest inputs, like iPods and the like. This is the reason why the M-T has the largest gain compared to all the other amps.

You can even replace (as I did for sound tuning purposes) the drivers from 12AU7 to 12AT7 or higher gain drivers, and still get great sound at even higher gain.

I'm not familiarized with the specs of the phono-pre you ordered, but Steve will confirm this either way.

I said 'bang for buck' but not ultimate sound! I said 'the best sound (I can afford'). Not even you have the ultimate sound out of your system, I'm sure, nobody does.

The steep exponential curve of diminishing returns is a big barrier to get the ultimate sound. There are probably better audio components than Decware's out there, that are so expensive these are out of reach for 97% of enthusiasts, but that's hardly the point.

For the money spent in power aids at those levels, there are better bang-for-the-buck alternatives, like better sourcing and the like. Money makes a difference if you know how to invest it.

BTW, when Steve proposed the M-T to me, he used the voltage regulation/filtering stages as one of his main arguments in favor of it, saying he would not recommend an amp without this, unless one was able to invest in a power regeneration plant, ala PS Audio. He never even mentioned the tube-rolling feature as a selling proposition.

I won't go into your conversation with Steve. . . . If he were talking to ME he might pitch the tube-rolling. Nothing wrong with appealing to your listener.

I'll just agree to disagree with your idea of building a great system and where to invest, and again you're making judgments and assumptions about a power conditioning foundation you haven't experienced. In my opinion, the better sources etc. you climb to, the more that foundation is justified and needed.

Enjoy. I'm listening to "Curtis Live" and it sounds as it never has before. Great escape before I have to face the rest of the day.